The basic question of philosophy

As it has been said above, there exist a lot of different philosophical systems, many of them are quite incompatible with one another, for they deal with completely different sorts of problems. It happens that a problem compounding the basis of some system is not only absent but even more is quite nonsensical in another system. Therefore, it’s convenient to single out some central problem characteristics for a system, it may be called the basic question of philosophy [11].

For example, in the Marxist philosophy the basic question was formulated as the problem of priority: either material or ideal. As it was said, every philosopher sooner or later comes to this question. Running against it he will choose willy-nilly a position of either materialism or idealism. It ought to be noted that at first this formulating was set by another German philosopher Schelling and only later was borrowed by Marx. Marx and his followers gave out an indisputable priority to material (therefore, Marxism is considered a materialistic philosophy) but Schelling went on another way. He said the primary is neither material nor ideal but some identity of both. Therefore he didn’t refer himself to neither of these camps.

The basic question in Marx’s and Schelling’s formulating can’t be universal. There exist philosophical systems where it doesn’t go at all. Therefore, some other formulating is needed [11].

Thus, M. Heidegger the German 20th century philosopher has formulated it as follows: ‘Why does the real exist but on the contrary the nothingness doesn’t?’ [1, p. 222 – 225]. Or A. Camus the French philosopher and writer wrote in his “Myth of Sisyphe”: ‘There exists only one really important philosophic problem – the problem of suicide. To decide whether the life is worth living means to answer the basic question of philosophy. All the rest, if the Universe has three or more dimensions or if there exist nine or twenty categories of spirit, emerge after. They are only a game but, beforehand, the basic question should be answered’ [1, p. 228 – 236].

Date: 2014-12-21; view: 1450